Quick Takes: Bombs away

On second thought, perhaps the unexploded bomb wasn’t the best garden ornament. Sian and Jeffrey Edwards of Pembrokeshire, U.K., said they believed the 64-pound naval projectile was a dummy weapon given how much abuse it had undergone over the years: They would even strike the shell with a trowel to remove dirt after gardening. The couple told The Guardian a previous owner of the house had found the ordnance on a beach and hauled it home. On Nov. 29, a police officer spotted the bomb in their front yard and reported the explosive to the U.K.’s defense ministry. The next day, officials removed the bomb, which they later detonated after determining it was still live with a small charge. “It was an old friend,” Jeffrey Edwards said. “I’m so sorry that the poor old thing was blown to pieces.”

Nutty for doughnuts

Bypassing the city’s boutique bakeries and refined restaurants, nearly 400 customers lined up Dec. 6 for the grand opening of a new dining experience in Paris: Krispy Kreme. If the opening rush was crazy, French Krispy Kreme executive Alexandre Maizoué said the closing was rapturous: “People were banging on the windows, begging us to open the door.” Krispy Kreme hopes to open 500 more locations, kiosks, and supermarket points of sale in the next year. But the president of France’s industry group for bakers told CNN he’s not worried: “[The French] are not going to eat donuts every day.”

Squirmy smuggler

A Taiwanese tourist missed his flight out of Bangkok, Thailand, after he tried turning his pants into a zoo. On Dec. 5, airport authorities, suspicious of the passenger’s bulging pants, decided to give him a more rigorous security screening. That’s when they discovered the unnamed man had stuffed two otters and a prairie dog into his underwear to smuggle the animals back home. Officials say the suspect purchased the creatures at a Bangkok market and now faces charges for customs violations.

No bar too high

Overachieve much? Peter Park (center) of Tulare, Calif., was only 13 when he began taking high school and law school classes concurrently in 2019. On Dec. 6 Park’s employer, the Tulare County District Attorney, announced Park had become the youngest person ever to pass the California bar exam after he took the test in July at age 17. Park, now 18 and a newly sworn assistant district attorney, has a promising career ahead, but he might not hold his record for long: His sister, 16, hopes to pass the bar exam next July.

Floating tomato found

After eight months, a missing tomato aboard the International Space Station has been found. During a Dec. 6 livestream from the ISS, American astronaut Jasmin Moghbeli said the crew had found the missing fruit, although she didn’t reveal where it had been. The discovery is good news for fellow astronaut Frank Rubio, who in March ­harvested the tomato from an experiment testing food horticulture in zero gravity. Rubio, who returned to Earth in September after a record 371 days in space, said he spent up to 20 hours searching the ISS for the missing experimental tomato in hopes of proving he hadn’t eaten it.

Headstrong patient

At first the headaches bothered him. Then there was the fluid discharge. Finally, on Nov. 25, the Vietnamese man went to a hospital. There, after performing a CT scan of the patient’s head, doctors diagnosed him with tension pneumocephalus and found an amazing culprit: chopsticks. According to doctors at the Cuba Friendship Hospital in Dong Hoi, the man had a pair of chopsticks lodged in his skull. The unnamed patient told doctors the utensils may have been inserted up his nose during a fight months before. Alcohol was involved, he admitted. Doctors retrieved the chopsticks through endoscopic surgery, and the man was expected to recover.

Won by one

A hand recount completed Dec. 1 for a City Council position in Rainier, Wash., proved an old truism in politics: every vote matters. After a mandatory recount, a trio of Thurston County election officials confirmed that Ryan Roth narrowly edged out fellow candidate Damion Green by a single vote. Roth said he almost didn’t vote until his wife convinced him. “I was like, ‘It’s one vote. Whatever’s going to happen is going to happen,’” Roth told KING-TV. His wife was right. Unlike the ultimate one-vote winner, Green opted against voting for himself because he said it made him feel uncomfortable: “I thought it was kind of narcissistic, so I didn’t.”